Lili is Crying

Lili is Crying, Hélène Bessette's debut novel, explores the fraughtness and depth of the troubling relationship between Lili and her mother Charlotte. With a near-mythic quality, Bessette's stripped-back prose evokes at once the pain of thwarted love – of desire run cold – and the promise of renewal. Lauded by critics on its initial publication in 1953 for its boundary-pushing style, unusual economy of expression, strange humour and sheer vivacity, Lili is Crying announces Bessette's singular take on the 'poetic novel'. This edition marks the very first translation of Bessette's work into English, by Windham-Campbell Prize-winning author and translator Kate Briggs.



Hélène Bessette (1918–2000) published thirteen novels with Gallimard between 1953 and 1973, won the Cazes prize in 1954 and was twice in the running for the Goncourt prize and the Médicis prize.